Friday, December 9, 2011

The Correlation between Lax Gun Laws and Crime Gun Exports to Other States

My recent post on the statistics for deaths of law enforcement, in which I was focusing on the deaths by firearms in the context of the Virginia Tech shooting of a police officer, raised some interesting questions.

One of those questions had to do with the problems of guns used in crimes coming across borders from other states and gun regulation, as it pertains to firearm deaths (and injuries) generally, and those of law enforcement specifically.

Because most of the pro-gun crowd seem to have a difficult time acknowledging the connection and correlation between the number of firearms in this country, and the number of firearms deaths and injuries in this country, as a basis for firearm regulation, I found the following site to be of interest. It shows very clearly how lax firearm laws in some states create greater problems for the adjoining states. I think this is a good foundation for why we need uniform federal regulation of firearms, rather than the lax and inconsistent, and sometimes very ill enforced, patchwork of state laws.

The web site Trace the Guns has an excellent interactive map of crime gun exports, that shows clearly which states have the highest exports, and that documents a comment made by our own democommie on a related post:

FatWhiteMan: This: <i>"but the availability of firearms from outside of Virginia coming over their borders remain a problem."</i> Is, to you, an irresponsible statement? I think there are some giant leaps on your side.

One of the states which shows the HIGHEST rate of firearms export to other states is in fact West Virginia, which borders Virginia. I believe has relatively lax firearms laws, per this article in Wikipedia which conveniently provides a summary of gun laws for comparison by state.

Where I believe our readers who check out the Wikipedia article "Gun Laws in the United States (by state)" will find the difference between the two states is in the kind of check that is mandated in Virginia that were enacted after the 2007 Virginia Tech mass shooting; those measures are addressedin a recent post here.

Clearly the information on the weapon, the identity of the apparent shooter who subsequently committed suicide, the motive and other details are still emerging, but I believe the contrast between the export of firearms from West Virginia, in comparison to Virginia and other states, and in comparison to the data on law enforcement deaths is significant to the ongoing debate here.

I find the correlations it makes to hold up rather well when measured and confirmed by a variety of metrics.

But do feel free to express your criticisms of the methodology. However,if your point is that those flaws negate the findings of the sources I've posted, I think you have an uphill battle to overcome that threshold.

Why is guns exported per capita a useful measure? Why control for the population of the exporting state? The metric has no face validity that I can see.

Not just ANY guns exported per capita; please read more closely. This is measuring CRIME Gun exports.

Therefore it makes the case that the less checking there is, and the easier it is to acquire and carry a firearm, the easier it also is for the firearms from those states to be involved in crime - not only in the state of origin, but also in other states that are more stringent or restrictive in requiring a thorough check on gun buyers and/or which have more stringent penalties for purchasing a firearm for someone who is disqualified from gun ownership.

40 % of the guns submitted for tracing couldn't be traced. They are guns found at crime scenes, not necessarily used in a crime. Controlling for population has no face validity. Many guns used in crimes are not left at the scene. TTC values of ten years do not support the idea that there is any trafficking problem at all.

That's just off the top of my head. Oh oh, and the source of the report is a virulently anti-gun group.

MAgunowner said... 40 % of the guns submitted for tracing couldn't be traced. They are guns found at crime scenes, not necessarily used in a crime.

But you are unable to demonstrate that they were not involved in some way - either directly or indirectly - with those crimes.

Since your side of the argument regularly makes the assertion these are inanimate objects which cannot go anywhere on their own, it is reasonable to posit they likely have a connection to the people at the crime scene, regardless of whether they were a direct part of that crime or simply in the possession of criminals.

I think one of MAgunowner's points is that there is a big difference between what they consider "crime guns" and guns used in a crime. If you bust someone for growing weed in their Beckley, WV farm and they had three shotguns in the house, those are now considered "crime guns" even though they may have not left the closet since the GCA of '68 became law--which means they are untraceable.

MAgunowner said... Or belonging to a law abiding person who was the victim of a home invasion. Either way the data don't allow for the distinction.

No,my reading of this site is that a homeowner who had a home invasion's firearm would be traceable, it would have an address and at least some possibility / probability of a history for it.

In the case of the pot bust:If you bust someone for growing weed in their Beckley, WV farm and they had three shotguns in the house, those are now considered "crime guns" even though they may have not left the closet since the GCA of '68 became law--which means they are untraceable.

That may be closer to the case for what they deem untraceable. I would argue that the pot growers are in an illegal and inherently risky business, and that therefore those guns COULD fairly be considered part of the criminal pot operation, and would be fairly counted.

But again, it would seem plausible to me that so long as the criminals were alive and arrested rather than shot dead in some kind of shootout, that these would not be considered untraceable. Rather there are people who can provide information about the weapons origins and connections to the pot growers.

Possibly, but you have no statistics or alternatively expert sources that you've used to back up that statement.

If we posit this is true, that just proves there are even MORE firearms out there among criminals, and that if the trend of lax states exporting to stringent states holds true for the crime guns we can trace there is no basis or justification for assuming the absent weapons came from different sources than the traced weapons did.

Again, if it is your contention that the guns used in crimes that are taken away from crime scenes have some very different origins,you would need to both support that with documentation - and you can't - AND provide a cogent explanation for why those removed firearms differ in origin from the ones that we can trace.

I don't think you can do that either, nor do your caveats invalidate these statistics.

Sorry, but the guns in the home of someone growing marijuana are crime guns.

See 18 USC 922 (q)(1) The Congress finds and declares that—(A) crime, particularly crime involving drugs and guns, is a pervasive, nationwide problem;(B) crime at the local level is exacerbated by the interstate movement of drugs, guns, and criminal gangs;

and 18 USC 924(D) Notwithstanding any other provision of law—(i) a court shall not place on probation any person convicted of a violation of this subsection; and(ii) no term of imprisonment imposed on a person under this subsection shall run concurrently with any other term of imprisonment imposed on the person, including any term of imprisonment imposed for the crime of violence or drug trafficking crime during which the firearm was used, carried, or possessed.(2) For purposes of this subsection, the term “drug trafficking crime” means any felony punishable under the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 801 et seq.), the Controlled Substances Import and Export Act (21 U.S.C. 951 et seq.), or chapter 705 of title 46.

(3) The offenses referred to in paragraphs (1) and (2)(C) of this subsection are—(A) any crime of violence, as that term is defined in section 924 (c)(3) of this title;(B) any offense punishable under the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 801 et seq.) or the Controlled Substances Import and Export Act (21 U.S.C. 951 et seq.);

Or as one judge said to a defendant: "as far as I know, Marijuana is still illegal."

Hard to argue those people were just law abiding citizens if they're breaking the law!

MA gunner, if you were misunderstood or misinterpreted, please elaborate.

Or you might try doing what I would do, contact the Trace the Guns group and ask them to respond to your questions about their methodology.

Other than to speculate and explain what understand from reading them - and then looking at other corroborating data I found separately - I'm not comfortable speaking for them, since I cannot provide in depth information for you.

Basically we were arguing about the different between correlating guns to “gun deaths” (a statistically pointless approach), vs. correlating guns to homicide rates (now we are getting somewhere). You guys kept saying it has been done countless times by reputable unbiased researchers (using Joyce funds), and I kept pointing out that they were showing “gun deaths”, not homicide rates. I said I would compile data using the FBI Unified Crime Report (UCR) vs. Laci’s link to LCAV for gun ownership found here:

http://www.lcav.org/Gun_Laws_Matter/Gun_Laws_Matter_Chart.pdf

By the way, this was Laci’s answer to correlating guns to murder rates, of which it does no such thing. So I did it for them using THEIR data for ownership (which is the big unknown in all this). If you ask, I will post all my raw numbers so you can run your own calculations if you don’t trust me. This is what I came up with:

The Pearson coefficient for LCAV state gun ownership rate vs. 2009 homicide rate is -0.02645. Oops, that is not good for you gun control folks. You need a positive number that says as gun ownership goes up, so does the homicide rate. No wonder LCAV used “gun deaths” instead. Now, that is an extremely small negative number, so I am not touting it as proof that guns reduce homicides. What it says is that there is NO CORRELATION. Now to compare apples to apples, I also ran the homicide numbers for 2002, since that is when the data was collected for gun ownership. For 2002 the Pearson coefficient is -0.08935. Ouch, that is even more negative, albeit still effectively zero.

I also ran the numbers vs. violent crime rates:

2009: -0.14332 2002: -0.25019

Now it is actually showing a slight statistical significance against your cause. Could it be that gun ownership reduces violence (being more likely to reduce overall violence than murders)? Maybe, but correlation does not equal causation so based on this data we can’t conclude that. It does unequivocally disprove that the presence of guns adds to violence or murder. Pearson correlations can give two answers: “no” and “maybe”.

Note: UCR released 2010 data since I ran these numbers, but I don’t expect we’ll see anything different.

The above is for gun ownership (remember those figures were provided by an anti-gun source). We can also look at strength of gun laws. I’ll use the Brady Campaign state scorecard (again provide by an anti-gun source). In this case, you gun control guys will want to see an inverse correlation, while we’ll be rooting for positive numbers.

Congratulations, you got your first number in your favor with 2009 homicides, but all these numbers are effectively zero. Again NO CORRELATION. You’ll note these numbers are pretty similar to the gun ownership numbers. I bet there is a real strong inverse correlation between gun ownership and strength of gun laws. Yep -0.76379. What does that tell us? People could say that maybe (“maybe” because correlation does not equal causation) gun control reduces gun ownership without reducing violent crime or homicide rates. In other words, it takes away guns from the law abiding without any appreciable result other than the fact that fewer people own guns. But I don’t think that is what is going on. It is the chicken and the egg- and I bet the chicken came first (as in low gun ownership preceded gun control). If we examined the change in Brady scores vs. gun ownership over time we could actually come up with a proper causation statement. However neither the Brady’s nor the LCAV provide a year by year numbers. If we did have that data, I predict we would see that when you don’t have a lot of gun owners fighting for their rights, you end up with a lot of gun control… and not much else, since neither violent crime nor homicide rates are affected.

Low and behold, you guys have a pretty solid correlation between gun ownership/Brady scores and suicide rates by state (note there are year differences in all the data: 2002 ownership, 2007 suicide rates, and 2010 Brady scores, but I don’t think it would look much different with common years):

Ownership vs. Suicide: 0.67119Brady Score vs. Suicide: -0.66289

So what do you do with this? Do you say “ah ha!”? To do that you’ll have to throw the baby out with the bath water, and admit the same research shows no correlation for homicide rates (and gun control pushes the crime element more than suicide). You would think guns are a more significant tool for murder than for suicide, right? The distance advantage of guns or the ability to do quick follow up shots plays no part in suicides. Perhaps the difference is that guns play no positive role to prevent suicides, but they DO have a positive role in self-protection against crime? I doubt you will admit that. Even I don’t believe that is what makes such a large difference in numbers (though it could play a small factor). No, I think this is simply a case of correlation does not equal causation. To prove causation we’d have to look at changes over time. Does increasing gun ownership increase the suicide rate? Does adding a new gun law that increases the Brady score reduce the rate of suicides? Again, to look at that we’d have to have LCAV and BC data over time and they don’t provide that. Also, there are other correlations to suicide other than gun ownership. For one, there is a geographical and financial correlation with these states. Also political (we know red states buy more guns). Maybe they kill themselves when they see Republicans running the government ;)

Furthermore, we could look at Western Europe, which you guys love to do when talking about homicide, but it doesn’t work for suicides (most western European countries have a significantly higher suicide rate than the USA). Remember this thread?

Again, you’d have to throw the baby out with the bathwater. To tout Europe’s homicide rate, you’d have to ignore their suicides. And to tout our suicides rates by state, you’d have to ignore our homicides. And to tout our national homicide rate, you have to ignore our national suicide rate. You can’t win. But it all works out nicely when you just say “gun deaths”, doesn’t it?

What is the annual economic loss associated with 31,000 deaths and 70,000 injuries? By looking at loss of income alone, each gun death can be valued at roughly $1.4M, or $43 Billion in total lost income [1]. A 1994 study published in JAMA concluded that medical costs from gun injuries cost another $2.3B, or $4B today including inflation [2]. The total economic costs of $47 Billion per year from gun industry externalities thus greatly exceed the economic benefit of the industry!

[1] Gun death rates peek in the 18-24 age range, and fall sharply after 30, according to the CDC (select Age under Output Group). Assume that the average person killed by a gun loses 35 years of productive life (from 35-70) . 35 years * US per capita income of roughly $40,000 equals $1.4 Million per person. No NPV adjustment is needed, because gun deaths are cumulative over time – last year’s gun deaths contribute to this year’s losses as well.

[2] This study concludes that the medical costs associated with firearms injuries were roughly $2.3B per year in 1994. Assuming a health care rate of inflation of 4% over the last 15 years (lower than the real rate!), this $2.3B equals $4B in 2009 dollars.

There are no statistical tricks, Laci. Just raw correlation calculations. You used the LCAV table to make your point, meaning you believe these types of correlations are important. I simply took the same table and substituted “gun deaths” for homicide rate, and sure enough, there is no correlation. Now you are saying it is a lie?

Your monetary figures mean nothing if you can’t link gun control to crime reduction. You can implement whatever gun control you want and you’ll still have $43 billion in lost income.

I'm not sure TS what you are trying to assert here. Homicides are intentional deaths, usually defined as some form of murder / manslaughter; gun deaths would include accidental gun deaths, and suicides. Could you please elaborate why it is you are using the terms interchangeably when they are not the same?

Dog gone: “Could you please elaborate why it is you are using the terms interchangeably when they are not the same?”

I’ll explain (but I’ll be out for the weekend, so I won’t have a follow up). Of course “gun deaths” and homicide are not interchangeable. We’ve been saying that for years. That is why you get a very different correlation when you look at the two of them. But the premise of gun control is that they are the most effective weapon for murder, which SHOULD mean that if you reduce their presence, fewer murders will occur. Substituting other weapons for guns would result in lives saved. Back in September, I asked you to show me stats that correlate the two. Each time, you guys came back with a “gun death” stat. As you said, these are not interchangeable. You guys can’t get past the fact that guns are effective weapons, and I’ll agree with you. But what statistics clearly show is that eliminating guns DOES NOT lower murder rates. There are just two many other factors at play. There are way too many other ways to kill people, AND guns also play an important role for good.

This is why you always have to fall back on the “gun death” stat. But since you have to have a gun in order for someone to die by a gun, it is statistically irrelevant to correlate the two. What you are trying to do is correlate X to (X + Y); where X is a gun, and Y is a death, so (X + Y) is a “gun death”. A Pearson calculation will always show a correlation because X is on both sides of the equation (at least that is true statically- a dynamic comparison over time may not yield a correlation even to “gun deaths”).

Car analogy time. Say you are on a crusade to ban convertibles because they are dangerous in accidents, and you want to use statistical correlations to make your point using the same type of data we have for guns. So you compile a list of which states have the most convertibles. You guys would then compare that list to car fatalities when driving a convertible, and say, “ah ha! Florida and California have the most convertibles and lead the nation in car accident fatalities when driving a convertible”. I however, would compare that list to the percentage of ALL auto accidents that are fatal and see if there is a correlation between those warm weather convertible states. If there is a correlation, further study would be needed to determine if there is causation. If there is no correlation- the study is done.

Based on what I showed you, and what Laci provided from LCAV, I can say that these two statements are true. Do you agree, and will you repeat them with me then? If you don’t agree with statement number 1, do what I did and show me complete data that shows otherwise, or point by point refute the numbers I provided.

1) There is no correlation between guns and murder rates.2) There is a correlation between the presence of a gun, and the use of a gun. (but… duh?)

"Car analogy time. Say you are on a crusade to ban convertibles because they are dangerous in accidents, and you want to use statistical correlations to make your point using the same type of data we have for guns. So you compile a list of which states have the most convertibles. You guys would then compare that list to car fatalities when driving a convertible, and say, “ah ha! Florida and California have the most convertibles and lead the nation in car accident fatalities when driving a convertible”. I however, would compare that list to the percentage of ALL auto accidents that are fatal and see if there is a correlation between those warm weather convertible states. If there is a correlation, further study would be needed to determine if there is causation. If there is no correlation- the study is done."

No, actually, I don't think WE would. I think you might, in order to make it look as if the "car v gun being equally dangerous or cars actually being more dangerous" analogy was an apt one. It's not.

Whenever gunzloonz start comparing auto deaths to gun deaths they compare the number of deaths by each and say, "See, cars are dangerous too, dangerouser even and driving isn't a RIGHT and shut up, that's why".

The reality is that automobiles and other conveyances are driven BILLIONS OF MILES every day on roads of varying serviceability, in completely uncontrollable weather conditions by people of different abilities and mental/emotional states. None of the millions of U.S. drivers who are on the road at any point in time have the slightest degree of control over other vehicles--none, zero, bupkus.

Bad weather, bad attitudes, improperly maintained vehicles, systemic glitches in signalling and traffic control hardware/software and other "bugs" in the system--never mind people who insist on driving while impaired--make driving a task that, unfortunately, a lot of drivers are not up to.

The systems of control and command for traffic are a major part of infrastructural and maintenance budgets at most levels of government. Billions of dollars are spent to build and maintain roads, fund police and other public safety departments, educate drivers and auto inspections to determine/ensure the roadworthiness of vehicles*.

I, for one, would be perfectly happy to not have MY vehicle inspected annually and have to spend money to fix things that don't need fixing for the vehicle to operate safely--not my call.

There is a reason that we have regulation--to a fairly high degree--drivers and vehicles. That reason is that it's for the public good. If we regulate cars and drivers in the same way that we regulate gunz and gunnerz we would have hundreds of thousands of traffic fatalities--or more--each year. Regulation, as onerous as it might be, is what keeps the system working.

Wasn't it TS who, some months back, was using some VERY tortured logic to defend idiots who store their gunz in the hall closet and then go to the edvard munch face* when they get stolen (and also say things like, "No one could have expected this to happen!")?

I'm glad to see TS commenting, but not so glad that I agree with him, especially about the silliness of the car analogy. democommie said it right. The use factor of cars compared to guns alone makes it an apples and oranges thing.

MikeB: “I'm glad to see TS commenting, but not so glad that I agree with him, especially about the silliness of the car analogy.”

You guys see the word “car” and you immediately turn to your boiler platter responses. Look again at the analogy. It has nothing to do with total car fatalities out numbering gun deaths. What it is about is how we analyze data to make a point. Wouldn’t it seem silly to restrict convertibles because the states with more convertibles have more accidents with convertibles? Try substituting convertibles for something sillier- like red cars.

shows a total of 1,831 officers being assaulted with firearms last year and 20,554 in the period 2001-2010.

Neither of the links indicates the severity of injury experienced by wounded officers over that period. Any situation involving a gun being fired, whether by "accident" or design is, inherently, "serious", yes? I don't think even the craziest gunzloon will suggest otherwise (but I'm always being surprised by the degree of indignorance that flourishes in some groups).

Thanks for correcting my error, I like the FBI's stats better.

20,554 police officers injured by guns. Wow. But then again, it's statistically negligible to the shooters.

As for the convertible analogy. It fails for the same reason that other "gunz = carz" analogies fail. Until we know what the underlying, under-reported/unreported circumstances are it is impossible to know WHY the accidents happen.

Do those who drive convertibles have less concern for the rules of the road? Do they drink too much, more often, than other drivers? Are convertibles inherently more difficult to drive? These, among other questions, are not asked or answered in your analogy. They are asked and answered where the LAGO is concerned, at least we're led to believe that they are.

Are you saying that some %age of LAGO's are fucking morons who have no idea about proper firearm handling procedures or that some %age of LAGO's are just sociopaths who don't give a flying fuck about their families, friends, neighbors and the general public. Are you saying that some %age of LAGO's are drug/alcholo abusers whose judgment is impaired, thus making them a risk to others if they have a weapon that allows for impulsive, incontrovertible acts of aggression towards others?

Or would you more likely say, "No, LAGO's, all of them, know and practice the FOUR RULES and would never, EVER violate them. So we don't need no steenkeen regulations!".

I'm going to put you down as a "Yes" for the second question, but I'll be holding on the survey for a bit so let me know if you change your opinion.